Minister cautions parastatals

SHARE | Wednesday, 20 July 2016 | By Kabelo Adamson

Parastatals under the Ministry of Transport and Communications have been cautioned to ensure that what they do is progressive, cost effective and value for money. Minister Tshenolo Mabeo sounded the warning on Thursday during the signing of Shareholder Performance Agreement with some of the parastatals under his ministry. Mabeo said the ministry has entrusted all parastatals under its portfolio with the necessary resources to deliver on their mandates, but gets disappointed when projects do not move or are of low quality. He appealed to them to up their game on service delivery. “This becomes a cost not only to the government but on the tax payer,” said Mabeo, advising the parastatals to be timely in their request for funds, noting that of late it has come to his attention that some parastatals request funds for operations very late, which creates challenges as the budgeting process has long started. He commended the Civil Aviation Authority of Botswana (CAAB) for successfully concluding the Significant Safety Concerns (SSCs) in December 2015 in which Botswana SSCs scored 71 percent against the world average of 63 percent.

On the Botswana Railways passenger train coaches, Mabeo said he is waiting with bated breath for the arrival of the remaining passenger coaches and has promised that this time around there will be no technical glitches. Only three parastatals attended the Thursday signing, while the remaining have been advised to do so before the end of the month. Only Botswana Fibre Networks BOFINET, Botswana Railways and Botswana Communications and Regulatory Authority (BOCRA) signed the agreement. Mabeo said the objective of the compact is to monitor and align the performance of the organisations to the wider government objectives and the ministry strategic plan. Key strategic deliverables for the ministry, Mabeo said include, consumer service standards; consumer awareness and stakeholder management; employment creation and citizen empowerment; quality services; financial performance and employees’ productivity among others. Mabeo said he is cognizant of the fact that some of the organisations have aligned their agreements to their organizational strategies which he said is commendable. "What I would like to see going forward is the continual monitoring and evaluation of the business plans such that we will not need to sign the agreements every year but amend and agree on the business plans on a yearly basis,” he said. He said the ministry is currently working with PEEPA to finalize a standardized evaluation tool that will be applied by all parastatals across government to monitor and evaluate performance.